After The End
by ghostly-writer
Summary: When there is nothing left in the world for you, when everything you ever loved has been torn from your hands by your own doing, the end has long since passed, and there is nothing left but After, which has no happy ending.


**After The End**

DISCLAIMER: I am not J K Rowling, and even if I were, I would be unlikely to be posting up my work on the internet, especially when there is probably some sort of legal contract that prevents her from doing so. And, as this work is being posted up on a site like I'm not receiving any money for this, so no gain, other than the gain of being able to express my own creative tendencies is made out of this. Only the plot of this is mine, and even that is mostly based on J K Rowling's wonderful novels, especially as this one shot serves as a sort of response to Deathly Hallows and the plot line of Severus' undying love for Lily.

Further, the lyrics (highlighted in italics) are also not mine, and are just 'borrowed' from Evanescence.

_Playground school bell rings, again_

The distant clang of metal broke the heavy stillness that surrounded the man, carving a way through the thick barriers that he had drawn up around himself, and striking at the very foundations of his mind. It was strange, how life could go on, how his lungs could keep expanding and contracting, how his heart could keep beating so palpably when the rest of him had descended into cold shock.

Why?

How?

Questions turned and encircled his mind, replaying with every step he took closer to his destination. Already he could see it, the house half destroyed, and yet until he felt and touched, and knew with his own hands, he would not, could not believe it could have happened.

_Rain clouds come to play, again_

A ripple of thunder passed overhead and the first cold drops of rain fell upon his face, but he did not feel them. How could he, possibly, when all his body was numb and cold with disbelief?

Another thunderclap, louder this time, reverberating long after the sound had stopped, accompanied with a sudden outpouring of rain. It was hard to tell if it was raindrops or silent tears that poured down the man's haggard face now, but he merely pulled his cloak further over his head, shadowing his face from any emotions that passed across it.

With each step his heart grew heavier, his head bent, passing unnoticed through the swarms of people surrounding the house. Then, finally, as he neared the bushes of yellow roses that welcomed visitors he looked up, facing the truth and the reality of what had happened. His heart had somehow stopped, but his limbs continued to move like mist through the open gate, ignoring the voices, the screams and shrieks that seemed muffled to his ears. Up the well-worn pathway, through the gaping hole where a door had once stood, over the threshold and up the stairs covered with a thin layer of pale white dust.

The landing creaked ominously as he laid his foot upon it, but he continued on regardless. He had to know.

There was another low rumble, but it was too halting to be thunder. He drew into the shadows almost as a reflex action, though there wasn't any need. Another rumble broke the silence, this time accompanied by a broken sob, and a voice muttering almost incoherently. "'Arry!"

The voice carried through the open doorway, the ever-calm tones of Hagrid shaking uncontrollably. The man breathed in sharply as he heard another few words stand out from Hagrid's incomprehensible stammering.

"'Poor Lily."

There was a soft cry of an infant, then the steady crooning of Hagrid, then another loud rumble, which grew for an instant before slowly fading away into nothing.

_Has no one told you she's not breathing?_

There was silence, and it was only then that the man dared to breathe again, and allowed his limbs to relax enough to lead him towards the doorway. He closed his eyes, already sensing what he was about to see, but wanting to keep the one last shred of ignorance a moment longer.

Finally, he opened them, simultaneously crossing the threshold, seeing at close hand the damage that had been wrought upon Godrics Hollow; the upturned cot, the light bulb swinging precariously from a single wire, the glassless window; and there, surrounded by all the remnants of the explosion, was her - Lily. She looked as though she was simply sleeping, her face pure and untarnished, even as her surrounds echoed the destruction wrought on the rest of the house. A chilling howl of grief rent through the air, shattering the silence into broken remnants of yesteryear. He leapt to her side in a moment knowing, even as he didn't want to know, that she was not sleeping.

She was gone.

_Hello, I'm your mind, giving you someone to talk to...hello..._

His eyes filled with unshed tears as he took her limp hand in his, while his other gently, tenderly caressed her pale face. Her once crackling hair lay still now, surrounding her face in a perfect halo of fire that would nevermore fall over her face as she laughed, nevermore fall across her eyes just waiting, waiting to be tucked away again. He sighed, knowing that he'd never had the chance to give her that simple act of intimacy that seemed destined to belong to Potter and Potter only.

Anger burned inside him, entwined with guilt, because he knew it was his fault, entirely his fault. He moaned again, the sound not coming from his voice but from something far deeper within him; the sound of a dying creature.

He was alone, so alone, and as he lay down beside Lily, his fingers still wrapped around her own, his black hair entangling with her own, he wished he could stay here forever, just lie here, sleeping with her, to never be disturbed by the world again.

_If I smile and don't believe_

He closed his eyes, just feeling her skin beneath his own, feeling in death what he had never felt in life. How long he stayed like that he did not know. It couldn't be real. It couldn't be true. It was just a dream, no, a nightmare, one from which he'd wake. Oh, reality was not so happy, but it was better than this, better than the coursing pain that seemed to reach to every crevice of his being, touching parts of his heart he never even knew existed. It was unbearable, and he could feel the fire within him burn, licking and tearing at his insides, blistering every memory, every raw emotion that he had kept hidden for so long.

_Soon I know I'll wake from this dream_

It was so dark, and yet at the same time his mind was filled with an eternal fire glittering green, interlaced with black, and even as his mind forced him to block it out he could only reach closer, drawing closer to the very thing that tore at his insides, drawing closer to the heat as it dragged him in. And then, he was at the very centre of it, the fire encircling him, coming from his very being, and all was shut out except for the fire, burning in the very insides of his eyes, silent despair seeping into his bones as he lashed out attacking an invisible enemy. And then the fire was cooling - or was it him? - Swirling and turning away from him dissolving into a pair of glittering green eyes, eyes that sang of forgiveness, eyes that sang of pity, and even as he fought against the blackness of his mind, even as he felt the barriers draw up, and felt a huge heaving breath he could still see the eyes burning into his very soul, more painful than his own internal fire.

And he ran.

_Don't try to fix me_

Ran without knowing where he was going, ran, not noticing the tears coursing down his cheeks, ran even as his vision blurred, running only to get as far away from those eyes as possible, away from the pitying gaze, away from the eyes that had entranced him for so long, away from the guilt at knowing he was forgiven.

He didn't want to be forgiven.

He didn't want to be pitied.

But most of all he didn't want this pain to recede.

He deserved it, all of it. It was his fault; it had always been his fault. He deserved to feel this wretched pain, he deserved every stab in his heart when he breathed, deserved the darkest and most torturous of punishments to descend upon him.

And above all else, he deserved not to die.

_I'm not broken_

"She's nothing master, nothing but a mudblood, a fantasy and an illusion. I was mistaken to think she could ever become one of us. She was not worthy master."

His black eyes were still beads, calm, controlled, and nothing but a mask. He repeated himself coolly once more, prostrating himself at his master's feet:

"She is nothing to me."

_Hello, I'm the lie living for you so you can hide..._

His words echoed in his mind even as those green eyes surfaced, reproach mixing with the ever-present pity; pity, never love.

"She is nothing"

He could see her again, her red hair rising and falling in waves as she turned to flash him a smile, watching as she tumbled in the snow with James, oblivious to his hungry gaze, seeing her shaking as she sobbed alone, longing to wipe away every tear that had ever fallen from her lashes, watching as she gazed off into realms into which he could not follow.

"She is nothing."

_Don't cry..._

His heart was flooded with tears, tears he could never cry, salty droplets for every moment, every second she had been there, and for every second she was not. It was a reservoir that had been dammed up through bitterness and time, a steel barricade that hid away the blisters that still hissed with pain.

He could not cry, would not cry, and yet even as he determined against it the floodgates broke and hot wet tears spilled from his eyes dousing the fire that burned within. And yet the eyes did not leave, they stayed, haunting him even as his own stung with guilt and long repressed emotions.

_Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping_

It was fruitless to think that he could block those eyes out of his mind forever, but as the years passed, as time seemed to heal the wounds, leaving only scars that could be covered over, he believed they could disappear. Until a pair of glittering green eyes opened in front of him, and he knew he had not forgotten. And yet, even as his heart burnt at the sight of seeing those eyes again, hatred leaped up inside of him, seeing only the messy hair, the round glasses and scrawny figure that was James.'

_Hello, I'm still here, all that's left_

The boy.

The baby.

And in his ears echoed the quiet murmurs of a crying child, a child without a father, without a mother, a child who had lived, when she had not.

_Of yesterday..._

And he looked at the child, now boy, and he saw Lily's broken body upon the bedroom floor, and saw her lifeless form, and he saw her eyes in his face.

And he hated him.


End file.
